Crossfire (board game)

Last updated
Crossfire
Crossfire board game cover.jpg
Other namesKreuzfeuer (German)
Publishers Ideal Toy Company (1971-1977) [1]
Milton Bradley (1987-1994) [2]
Hasbro (2016-present) [3]
Publication1971;53 years ago (1971)
Genres Board game
LanguagesEnglish
Players2
Playing time10'
Age range7+

Crossfire is a board game created by the Ideal Toy Company in 1971. The object of the game is to score goals by pushing one of the two pucks into the opposing player's goal. This task is accomplished by shooting small metal ball bearings at the pucks using the attached guns. The earliest version of the game featured a flat board, whereas the 1990s release featured a dome-shaped board. This allows the ball bearings to roll into the players' bins more easily but can cause the pucks to indefinitely rest at the edges of the board. In the 2010s rerelease, the board was sloped with a shallow grade, preventing the pucks from sliding on their own as much and making it easier to get them away from the borders.

Contents

Gameplay

The two pucks are made of plastic and rest on a central metal ball bearing. The bearing can spin and roll within the plastic mold allowing greater puck movement and responsiveness to hits. One of the pucks is shaped like a triangle, the other a star. The object of the game is to get either piece into your opponent's goal. The first to three goals wins.

Marketing

The early 1990s American commercial campaign for this product may be arguably its better-known aspect, portraying the game featured in a supposed near post-apocalyptic future, with the game used for a battle between two young men as "the ultimate challenge". The hero in the exchange was portrayed by a young Tim Maynard, a Shakespearean actor who transitioned into daytime soap opera acting. [4]

Video game

An arcade video game version of Crossfire was planned for release by Atari in 1975. However, the game was not released, and only a small number of prototypes were produced. [5]

Reviews

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ball</span> Round object

A ball is a round object with several uses. It is used in ball games, where the play of the game follows the state of the ball as it is hit, kicked or thrown by players. Balls can also be used for simpler activities, such as catch or juggling. Balls made from hard-wearing materials are used in engineering applications to provide very low friction bearings, known as ball bearings. Black-powder weapons use stone and metal balls as projectiles.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hockey</span> Sports played with hockey sticks

Hockey is a term used to denote a family of various types of both summer and winter team sports which originated on either an outdoor field, sheet of ice, or dry floor such as in a gymnasium. While these sports vary in specific rules, numbers of players, apparel, and playing surface, they share broad characteristics of two opposing teams using a stick to propel a ball or disk into a goal.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hockey puck</span> Sports equipment for ice hockey

A hockey puck is either an open or closed disk used in a variety of sports and games. There are designs made for use on an ice surface, such as in ice hockey, and others for the different variants of floor hockey which includes the wheeled skate variant of inline hockey. They are all designed to serve the same function a ball does in ball games.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bearing (mechanical)</span> Mechanism to constrain relative movement to the desired motion and reduce friction

A bearing is a machine element that constrains relative motion to only the desired motion and reduces friction between moving parts. The design of the bearing may, for example, provide for free linear movement of the moving part or for free rotation around a fixed axis; or, it may prevent a motion by controlling the vectors of normal forces that bear on the moving parts. Most bearings facilitate the desired motion by minimizing friction. Bearings are classified broadly according to the type of operation, the motions allowed, or the directions of the loads (forces) applied to the parts.

<i>Breakout</i> (video game) 1976 video game

Breakout is an arcade video game developed and published by Atari, Inc. and released on May 13, 1976. It was designed by Steve Wozniak, based on conceptualization from Nolan Bushnell and Steve Bristow, who were influenced by the seminal 1972 Atari arcade game Pong. In Breakout, a layer of bricks lines the top third of the screen and the goal is to destroy them all by repeatedly bouncing a ball off a paddle into them. The arcade game was released in Japan by Namco. Breakout was a worldwide commercial success, among the top five highest-grossing arcade video games of 1976 in both the United States and Japan and then among the top three highest-grossing arcade video games of 1977 in the US and Japan. The 1978 Atari VCS port uses color graphics instead of a monochrome screen with colored overlay.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rolling-element bearing</span> Bearing which carries a load with rolling elements placed between two grooved rings

In mechanical engineering, a rolling-element bearing, also known as a rolling bearing, is a bearing which carries a load by placing rolling elements between two concentric, grooved rings called races. The relative motion of the races causes the rolling elements to roll with very little rolling resistance and with little sliding.

<i>Mouse Trap</i> (board game) 1963 board game

Mouse Trap is a board game first published by Ideal in 1963 for two to four players. It is one of the first mass-produced three-dimensional board games. Players at first cooperate to build a working mouse trap in the style of a Rube Goldberg machine. Then, players turn against each other to trap opponents' mouse-shaped game pieces.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Floor hockey</span> Group of sports

Floor hockey is a broad term for several indoor floor game codes which involve two teams using a stick and type of ball or disk. Disks are either open or closed but both designs are usually referred to as "pucks". These games are played either on foot or with wheeled skates. Variants typically reflect the style of ice hockey, field hockey, bandy or some other combination of sport. Games are commonly known by various names including cosom hockey, ball hockey, floorball, or simply floor hockey.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Roller in-line hockey</span> Sport discipline

Roller in-line hockey, American roller hockey or inline hockey, is a variant of hockey played on a hard, smooth surface, with players using inline skates to move and ice hockey sticks to shoot a hard, plastic puck into their opponent's goal to score points. The sport is a very fast-paced and free-flowing game and is considered a contact sport, but body checking is prohibited. There are five players including the goalkeeper from each team on the rink at a time, while teams normally consist of 16 players. There are professional leagues, one of which is the National Roller Hockey League (NRHL). While it is not a contact sport, there are exceptions, i.e. the NRHL involves fighting.

A linear-motion bearing or linear slide is a bearing designed to provide free motion in one direction. There are many different types of linear motion bearings.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Table hockey</span> Game for two players, derived from ice hockey

A table hockey game, also called rod hockey game, stick hockey, bubble hockey, and board hockey, is a game for two players, derived from ice hockey. The game consists of a representation of a hockey rink; the players score goals by hitting a small puck into the opposing "net" with cutout figures that represent hockey players. The figures are manipulated by rods below the "ice": each one slides forward and back along its own narrow slot when the player pushes or pulls on the rod, or rotates to shoot or stickhandle the puck when the player spins the rod. Though similar in concept to air hockey, table hockey games are more of a simulation of the sport of ice hockey while air hockey is more abstract.

<i>Ice Hockey</i> (1981 video game) 1981 video game

Ice Hockey is an ice hockey video game designed by Alan Miller for the Atari VCS, and published by Activision in 1981. Actor and comedian Phil Hartman starred in the commercial for the game.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Drawer</span> Box-shaped container that fits into a piece of furniture

A drawer is a box-shaped container inside a piece of furniture that can be pulled out horizontally to access its contents. Drawers are built into numerous types of furniture, including cabinets, chests of drawers (bureaus), desks, and the like.

Super Monkey Ball is a series of arcade platform video games initially developed by Amusement Vision and published by Sega. The series debuted in 2001 with the arcade game Monkey Ball, which was ported to GameCube as Super Monkey Ball later that year. Several sequels and ports have been released.

A fingerboard is a scaled-down replica of a skateboard that a person "rides" with their fingers, rather than their feet. A fingerboard is typically 100 millimeters (3.9 in) long with width ranging from 26 to 55 mm, with graphics, trucks and plastic or ball-bearing wheels, like a skateboard. A fingerboard can be used to do traditional skateboarding tricks, such as an ollie and kickflip.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Virtuality (product)</span> Virtual reality gaming machine

Virtuality was a range of virtual reality machines produced by Virtuality Group, and found in video arcades in the early 1990s. The machines delivered real-time VR gaming via a stereoscopic VR headset, joysticks, tracking devices and networked units for a multi-player experience.

A cam follower, also known as a track follower, is a specialized type of roller or needle bearing designed to follow cam lobe profiles. Cam followers come in a vast array of different configurations, however the most defining characteristic is how the cam follower mounts to its mating part; stud style cam followers use a stud while the yoke style has a hole through the middle.

Sente Technologies was an arcade game company. Founded as Videa in 1982 by several ex-Atari employees, the company was bought by Nolan Bushnell and made a division of his Pizza Time Theatre company in 1983. In 1984 the division was acquired by Bally Midway who continued to operate it until closing it down in 1988. The name Sente, like Atari, is another reference to Bushnell's favorite game, Go and means "having the initiative."

<i>Ballistix</i> 1989 video game

Ballistix is a video game created by Martin Edmondson for the Amiga and Atari ST and published by Psyclapse in 1989. It was also converted to a number of other home computers in the same year and the PC Engine/TurboGrafx-16 console in 1991. It is a fictional futuristic sport involving directing a puck to a goal by shooting small balls at it.

References

  1. "Crossfire (Ideal first edition 1971)" . Retrieved 2024-06-23.
  2. "Crossfire (Milton Bradley edition 1994)" . Retrieved 2024-06-23.
  3. "Crossfire (Hasbro edition 2016)" . Retrieved 2024-06-23.
  4. Caswell, Drew (July 13, 2021). "Crossfire: The Shoot-Out Game with the Most Amazing '90s Commercial". Retropond. Retrieved June 19, 2024.
  5. "System 16 - Atari Discrete Logic Hardware" . Retrieved 2024-06-23.
  6. "GAMES Magazine #93". September 1988.